A Philosophy of Walking by Frédéric Gros Read Free Book Online

– as he was – to suffering, he continued to work and busy himself. He struggled on. But when the leg became completely rigid he decided to leave, selling up at a loss. On 7 April he left Harar for ever, at six in the morning, on a litter. He engaged six men to carry him, taking turns. Eleven days of unrelieved suffering, including one period of sixteen hours under lashing rain: ‘That did me a lot of harm.’ More than 300 kilometres in eleven days, carried, shaken about, he who knew so well how to cover the ground! After a short stop to settle his affairs, another eleven days on a ship (the
Amazone
) to reach Marseille.
    He was taken to the Conception hospital. ‘I’m bad, very bad.’ Urgent amputation was deemed necessary. They cut well above the knee. ‘The doctor says I’ll still be getting it for a month, and even then I will only be able to start walking again very gradually.’ The cut healed correctly. ‘I’ve ordered a wooden leg, it only weighs two kilos, it’ll be ready in eightdays. I’ll try to walk very slowly with that.’ Immobility infuriated Rimbaud. His mother came to see him at one point, then returned home. ‘I would like to be doing this and that, going here and there, seeing, living, going away.’ He couldn’t bear the hospital any longer, and decided to return to his family in Roche, by train. Back to the starting point after twenty years. His sister Isabelle cared for him with immense devotion, ignoring his irascibility. His condition worsened nevertheless: he hardly ate, he could no longer sleep, his whole body hurt. He drank infusions of the poppy all day long.
    Mere skin and bone, insubstantial as an autumn leaf, he still decided to set off again. Even summer had become too cold for him in the North. He would board a ship from Marseille and disembark at Algiers, or Aden. He was close to the end, but he wanted to leave, and he left. ‘Lord, when cold is the prairie.’ Towards the sun.
    On 23 August, accompanied by his sister, he took a train. Every transfer, from the house to the cart, from the cart to the train, from station to station, was a new calvary. The journey broke him completely, and he was hospitalized on arrival at Marseille.
    The doctors who received him knew he was dying: they gave him a few weeks, months at most. This would be his last stop, but no one told him so. On 3 September he managed to note in a firm, unshaky hand: ‘I am awaiting the artificial leg. Send it to me at once when it arrives, I am in a hurry to get away from here.’
    To walk again. Every day he talked about his new leg,he longed for it so that he might ‘try to stand up, to walk’. He was in constantly increasing pain, he wept on seeing through the window a vivid blue sky, calling him to go out. As if in bitter reproach, he told his sister: ‘I’ll be going into the ground and you’ll still be walking in the sun!’ His whole body was gradually stiffening, going rigid. ‘I’m just an immobile log.’ He was taking morphine almost continuously, to suppress the unbearable agony. Early in November he fell into delirium. It was his final week.
    Isabelle’s memoirs include an account of the dying Rimbaud’s last-minute conversion, * but if I had to state a preference it would strongly favour the description of his final delirium. He was confined to bed, his upper body increasingly paralysed. Soon the heart would be affected. He was hallucinating: he saw himself walking, departing once again. He was in Harar, and had to leave for Aden.
    ‘Let’s go!’ How many times had he said that? The caravan had to be organized, camels found and hired. He dreamed that his prosthetic leg was a success, that he ‘walked very easily’. He was running, desperate to be on his way. ‘Quick, quick, fasten the valises and let’s leave.’ His last words: ‘Quick, they’re expecting us.’ He complained that he shouldn’t be allowed to sleep so much, for it was late. It was too late.
    ‘Lord, when cold